asylum seekers and refugees, 27 and applies with regard to the country to which removal is to be effected or any other country to which the person may subsequently be removed. 28 It is non-derogable and applies in all circumstances, regardless of the nature of activities the person concerned may have been engaged in. 29 19. Under the above-mentioned obligations, the sending State has a duty to establish, prior to implementing any removal measure, that the person whom it intends to remove from its territory or jurisdiction would not be exposed to a danger of serious human rights violations such as those mentioned above. 30 Where the receiving State has given diplomatic assurances with regard to a particular individual, or where there are assurances in the form of clauses concerning the treatment of persons transferred under a general agreement on deportations or other forms of removal, these form part of the elements to be assessed in making this determination. Such assurances do not, however, affect the sending State’s obligations under customary international law as well as international and regional human rights treaties to which it is party. 31 27 For States Party to the ICCPR, this has been made explicit by the Human Rights Committee in its General Comment No. 31, above footnote 26, at paragraph 10. Similarly, in its General Comment No. 6 (2005) on the Treatment of unaccompanied and separated children outside their country of origin, U.N. Doc. CRC/GC/2005/6, 3 June 2005, the Committee on the Rights of the Child stated that States party to the Convention on the Rights of the Child “[…] shall not return a child to a country where there are substantial grounds for believing that there is a real risk of irreparable harm to the child, such as, but by no means limited to, those contemplated under articles 6 [right to life] and 37 [right to be free from torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment and right not to be arbitrarily deprived of liberty] of the Convention.” 28 See Human Rights Committee, General Comment No. 31, above footnote 26, at paragraph 12. 29 See, for example, Human Rights Committee, General Comment No. 29 on States of Emergency (Article 4), U.N. Doc. CCPR/C/21/Rev.1/Add.11, 31 August 2001, at paragraph 11; Human Rights Committee, Concluding Observations/Comments on Canada, U.N. Doc. CCPR/C/CAN/CO/5, 2 November 2005, at paragraph 15; Committee Against Torture, Gorki Ernesto Tapia Paez v. Sweden, U.N. Doc. CAT/C/18/D/39/1996, 28 April 1997, at paragraph 14.5. The absolute nature of the prohibition of refoulement to a risk of torture and other forms of ill-treatment under Article 3 ECHR has been affirmed by the European Court of Human Rights in Chahal v. United Kingdom, above footnote 26. See also Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, Report on the Situation of Human Rights of Asylum-Seekers within the Canadian Refugee Determination System, 28 February 2000, at paragraph 154. This also fully applies in the context of measures to combat terrorism. See, for example, Agiza v. Sweden, U.N. Doc. CAT/C/34/D/233/2003, 20 May 2005, in which the Human Rights Committee acknowledged that “measures taken to fight terrorism, including denial of safe haven, deriving from binding Security Council Resolutions are both legitimate and important. Their execution, however, must be carried out with full respect to the applicable rules of international law, including the provisions of the Convention [Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment], as affirmed repeatedly by the Security Council.” (at paragraph 13.1, with references to Security Council resolutions 1566 (2004) of 8 October 2004, 1456 (2003) of 20 January 2003 and 1373 (2001) of 28 September 2001). See also Security Council resolution 1624 (2004) of 14 September 2005. 30 Also relevant, particularly in the context of extradition, is the prohibition of return to serious violations of fair trial rights, as guaranteed under Article 14 ICCPR, Article 6 ECHR, Article 8 ACHR, Article 7 of the African (Banjul) Charter on Human and People’s Rights, and Articles 6, 7, 14 and 16 of the Arab Charter on Human Rights. 31 As noted by the Special Rapporteur on Torture, general statements in deportation agreements according to which those returned to a State party to the agreement will be treated in accordance 8